The first nine schools in Mayor Kenney’s community schools initiative are mostly on track to effectively implement the model, according to a new report by Research for Action that uses national benchmarks to measure progress.

The report was done in collaboration with the Mayor’s Office of Education, which is overseeing the project, and funded by the Ford Foundation. In addition to evaluating each of the schools, the report also rated the Mayor’s Office on its management.

Evaluators judged elements including whether the Mayor’s Office had built staff capacity, gathered local input, studied similar initiatives in other cities, and collected data on each school and its neighborhood.

Schools were judged on whether they created school committees that were representative of the community, held regular meetings, established goals and a vision, built local partnerships, and created a plan for moving forward.

Some schools hit most benchmarks and others fell short on some, but all the schools were moving forward, said Mark Duffy, one of the report’s authors.

“I can’t overemphasize the complexity of the model,” Duffy said. “The majority of the elements are on track, and this represents a lot of work.”

The idea of community schools is to make school buildings into neighborhood hubs for health, recreation, and social services. It's a model that is growing in popularity nationally. Ultimately, each school will look different after assessing the community’s unique needs, building partnerships, and developing a plan. The theory is that reaching the “whole child” and aiding families in primarily low-income neighborhoods creates a better learning environment.

It is an accepted “intervention” for struggling schools in the national Every Student Succeeds Act, as well as the ESSA plan developed by Pennsylvania.

All the schools are conducting outreach, Duffy said. Some are in more of an “emergent stage” in some areas, such as developing partnerships, he said.

“I wouldn’t characterize this as some schools doing better than others because each school is so individual. Some already had long histories of working with lots of partnerships, while others don’t have that kind of history. This is just a continuum of how far they’ve gotten, but they all didn’t start in the same place,” he said.

A statement issued by the Mayor’s Office of Education said that monitoring the initiative using national best practices is crucial.

“We have to lay the right foundation for the programs and partnerships we’re bringing into schools, and the progress report shows that we are on the right track,” said Chief Education Officer Otis Hackney. "As the report demonstrates, we’ve taken care to seek public input on the process and work with each of the school communities to make sure that we’re effectively matching services with needs.”

Susan Gobreski, the city’s community schools director, said that the report “shows that we’re taking the necessary steps for long-term success.” She noted that it is “too early” to assess student outcomes, but that the city is “already moving on some of the areas identified for development.”

The initiative is being funded through revenue from the city's sugary drinks tax. Kenney has said he wants to expand the program to 25 community schools. Currently, there are 12. The second cohort of schools was scaled back because the tax is still in litigation.

The School Reform Commission gave Superintendent William Hite his report card today, and it looks like he gets an “A," and he's being rewarded with a raise.

In its annual evaluation of the superintendent, the SRC measures his performance using four levels: distinguished, proficient, needs improvement, and failing. He is assessed in six areas. In student growth and achievement, systems leadership, and human resource management, he was rated “proficient.”In the other three areas — district operations and financial management, communication and community relations, and professionalism — he was rated as “distinguished.”

“The 2016-2017 school year was one of academic progress, increased stability and positive momentum,” SRC Chair Joyce Wilkerson said in a statement. “Because of Dr. Hite’s leadership and unwavering focus, the School District of Philadelphia not only continues to make important strides but is in a stronger position today than it was one year ago.”

In the evaluation, the commission praised Hite for “steady leadership” that “led to another year of a balanced budget, sustained investment in classrooms, a contract with Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, and, most importantly, the increased academic achievement of our students.”

Perhaps the biggest achievement for Hite in the 2016-17 year was ending the four-year stalemate between the teachers' union and the District over a new contract. According to a release from the District, breaking the contract logjam and establishing a successful substitute-teacher program helped Hite improve in the human resources and management category from "needs improvement" last year to "proficient" this year.

This year, three more schools were added to Mayor Kenney’s community schools initiative, which turns schools into community hubs to address the needs of the surrounding neighborhood.

Kenney also praised Hite’s leadership.

“Dr. Hite has been critical in forging a stronger partnership between the District and the city,” he said in a statement. “Without his openness, we would not have 12 community schools or new behavioral health supports for our students.”

This will be the first year since Hite began in June 2012 that he will get a pay raise as superintendent. Hite's pay increase is tied to teachers' raise for their average base salary, or 3.92 percent.

Hite’s new annual salary is $311,760, and his contract runs through Aug. 31, 2022.

The city’s community schools initiative continued to expand this week as Alain Locke Elementary in West Philadelphia was named to a list of schools that aim to serve as hubs for families and locals.

Under the initiative – which the Mayor’s Office of Education began last year – Locke will have a community schools coordinator who will work with the school, students, families, local service providers, and city agencies to identify the needs of the community and bring resources to the school to address those needs. In essence, the school is intended to become a community center offering services such as job training, health services, and afterschool programs.

“We want parents and neighbors to see Locke as a hub that can address their social, emotional, academic, and health-care needs,” said Locke principal Katherine Carter. “A community schools approach will expand what we have to offer to the community and complement our efforts to improve students’ reading and math levels and prepare them for success.”

In 2014, the school's neighborhood was designated a Promise Zone – a high-poverty area designated to receive extra federal resources to boost community development. Drexel University will provide support using the $30 million five-year grant from the U.S. Department of Education that it received last year.

Through its Lindy Scholar program, in which Drexel students tutor and mentor 6th- to 8th-grade students, the university has partnered with the school for several years.

Lucy Kerman, Drexel’s senior vice provost for university and community partnerships, said the community schools approach “perfectly complements the Promise Neighborhood goal of leveraging education to break the cycle of intergenerational poverty.”

Locke is one of seven Promise Zone schools. The others are Belmont Charter, Morton McMichael Elementary, Martha Washington Elementary, Samuel Powel Elementary, SLA Middle School and West Philadelphia High School.

“Our vision for this partnership is to build a stronger connection between the school and increased health and economic resources available in the Promise Neighborhood,” Kerman said.

The community schools initiative began in 2016 with nine schools. The schools include five elementary schools: Cramp, Edmonds, Gideon, Logan, and Southwark; three high schools: Kensington Health Sciences, Dobbins, and South Philadelphia; and Tilden Middle School.

Two more schools were added in July 2017 – Gompers Elementary and Washington High. The goal is to have 25 schools included in the initiative.

“We are glad that the Promise Neighborhood will feature a community school beginning this year,” said Susan Gobreski, director of community schools for the Mayor’s Office of Education.

“The city is a supportive partner on the Promise Neighborhood grant, and we are excited to work with Drexel to bring more solutions and opportunities to Locke and the surrounding neighborhood using the community schools model,” she said.

The city and School District named two more community schools Wednesday, expanding the network to 11.

Gompers Elementary in West Philadelphia and George Washington High School in the Far Northeast were added.

The initiative, which has been a priority for Mayor Kenney's administration, is an effort to make schools into neighborhood hubs for social services and other assistance for students and their families. Originally, the city had hoped to add five schools this year, but it cut back its plans due to continued litigation over the tax on sugary beverages, which is the source of funds for the program. The initiative costs about $3 million a year.

Kenney made the announcement at City Hall, along with Council President Darrell Clarke, School Superintendent William Hite, and Otis Hackney, chief of the city’s Office of Education.

“We’re losing time over this stupid legal challenge,” Kenney said. “The only way to overcome the cycle of poverty is through education.”

The beverage industry has sued over the tax. The city won the first two rounds, but the case could head to the Supreme Court.

Kenney’s goal is to have 25 community schools within four years. He’s following the theory of a growing national movement that says addressing health and social-emotional needs of children and families in schools can create better learning conditions by mitigating the effects of poverty and stabilizing communities.

Kenney said that 24 schools had submitted applications and that these two were chosen both for the quality of their submissions and to expand the geographic diversity of the cohort.

Hite said the initiative is part of a renewed effort to integrate city services into schools. “Community schools gave us the map or pathway to do that,” he said.

The first nine schools spent last year assessing community needs and developing action plans. Several have focused on nutrition, either through community gardens or by sending students home with backpacks of food near the end of the month.

Like the nine others, Gompers and George Washington each will get a community schools coordinator that is paid for by the city and will spend the first year assessing needs and developing a plan of action.

Gompers and George Washington both sit in solidly middle-class neighborhoods. The poverty and unemployment rates are below city average in both neighborhoods, according to data released by the Mayor’s Office of Education. That’s a departure from the first nine schools, which were largely located in very low-income communities.

Striving for geographic diversity

The mayor’s staff placed a premium on geographic diversity in this round of selections, according to Susan Gobreski, the director of Philadelphia’s community schools initiative. Both George Washington and Gompers are located far from Center City and in neighborhoods not served by the initial cohort of schools.

“One of the things we heard from Philadelphians when we did our community outreach work and our initial listening tour was how important it was for them to see this get to lots of places,” Gobreski said.

Gompers and George Washington also belong to City Council districts not represented in the first community schools cohort – Gompers in District 4 and Washington in District 10.

George Washington serves a large English learner population; half the residents in the surrounding neighborhood are foreign-born, according to city data. That melting-pot dynamic appealed to city officials as they sorted through applicants.

Chris Miele, a teacher at the school, said 40 to 45 percent of the students are immigrants or first-generation Americans, from places as diverse as India, Eastern Europe, and West Africa.

“Just walking down the street, you’ll hear 20 different languages,” said Sana Ahmadi, a rising senior at George Washington whose parents are refugees from Afghanistan. She estimated that 60 languages are spoken by students at the school.

Miele said that Washington once had social programs in place for things like mental health, tutoring, and mentoring, but that for the most part they “fell by the wayside” in the wake of budget cuts. He hopes that the community schools initiative will restore those services, especially for the large newcomer population.

Residents of the Far Northeast often feel neglected by city government, but Ahmadi expressed the opposite sentiment when asked her reaction to George Washington becoming a community school.

Gompers is a small elementary school in Overbrook. Although the neighborhood has just a 13.6 percent poverty rate – about half the citywide rate – most of its 348 students come from households below the poverty line. Almost all of Gompers' students are African American.

Gompers principal Phillip DeLuca wants to improve reading scores and attendance at the school. He hopes that eventually, the community schools initiative will make Gompers more desirable to neighborhood residents.

He imagines a future where “every single child living in Wynnefield is going to want to come to Samuel Gompers Elementary School.”

Teachers on board

The community schools initiative also has the strong support of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers.

“We at the PFT recognize that poverty presents formidable barriers for our children and education is critically important to their future,” said Evette Jones, the union’s director of community outreach. “Community schools are designed to help students focus on learning by helping us to focus on their needs.”

As all parties wait for the tax lawsuit to resolve, the Mayor’s Office is taking what Gobreski called a “middle path” on expanding the community schools initiative. The administration did not want to wait until the end of the legal conflict to start creating community schools, Gobreski said. But it also didn’t want to expand too fast, leery of letting the program grow too large when its source of funding could potentially wither.

Right now, the administration is using beverage tax revenue to support the initiative. Because the network of schools isn't expanding as fast as planned, there are some excess funds being held in reserve, according to mayoral spokesperson Lauren Hitt. The reserves will be used on community schools if the city prevails in court.

If the city does not prevail, it's unclear what would happen to community schools and other initiatives sponsored by the beverage tax. Right now, "no other revenue has been identified that could support community schools," Hitt said in an e-mail.

She added, "Given that two Courts have now upheld its constitutionality, we are hopeful that scenario will not come to pass."

Asked to describe her first year as the community schools coordinator at Southwark School in South Philadelphia, Beth Dougherty laughed.

"Hectic," she said.

That harried feeling comes partly from being in a K-8 school every day, with its myriad crises and endless activity. Part of it comes from trying to establish and grow the idea that Southwark can be a neighborhood nerve center for community services.

Dougherty, like the eight other coordinators at Philadelphia's first batch of community schools, spent a lot of her first year planning. She surveyed parents, students, and staff to figure out what kinds of outside resources they'd like. Then she created plans to fill in those gaps. Finally, as the school year closed, she started bringing in new outside partners and improving the coordination among those already operating within the school.

"I garden a lot, and it really is that explosion that happens in the middle of the summer where, all of a sudden, you have tomatoes," said Dougherty. "That's what it feels like."

It's been an explosive start for community schools, Mayor Kenney's signature K-12 education initiative. Plans originally called for five to seven schools in the first year, with 25 by the time Kenney ends his first term. Instead, the city selected nine schools in the first cohort. All nine released school plans in March that outline their goals for the next two years.

Turns out it's tough to conduct a public hearing when no one can hear you.

Pennsylvania Republican gubernatorial candidate Scott Wagner learned that the loud way Friday as he attempted to hold a meeting in Philadelphia's City Council chambers about the city's sweetened beverage tax.

His attempt was thwarted by a legion of horn-tooting, whistle-blowing, hand-clapping activists and union organizers who shouted him down from the gallery. Channeling the endurance of a South African soccer crowd, they kept a constant blare for 45 minutes. Eventually, Wagner and his colleagues on the Pennsylvania Senate's local government committee left the room and held a private press conference to discuss the aural ambush.

Wagner said the meeting would be rescheduled and held in Harrisburg.

Friday's ruckus added more intrigue to a hearing laden with political undertones.

Wagner, a conservative state senator from York, is campaigning to win his party's nomination and then unseat Gov. Wolf, a Democrat.

His Senate colleague Democrat Anthony Williams invited him to hold the hearing in Philadelphia – in the very same room where local lawmakers passed the new levy. Williams is a vocal opponent of the beverage tax and ran against its chief proponent, Jim Kenney, in the 2015 mayoral race.

Antonio Romero’s introduction to the Kensington neighborhood came when he was barely taller than the farebox on a SEPTA bus.

“My field work started when I was 7,” he said.

His father drove the Route 3 bus through the area, and along the way, he would have his son interview people on the street.

“He taught me that everyone had a story,” said Romero, who grew up in Bucks County but has returned to the neighborhood to live and to serve as community schools program coordinator at Kensington Health Sciences Academy.

Now, when he interviews neighborhood residents, he is looking not only to learn about them but also to change their lives.

Kensington is one of nine schools in Mayor Kenney’s community schools initiative, which seeks to “improve access to programs, services, and supports.”

The initiative, supported over the next four years by $40 million from the city’s new sweetened-beverage tax, is projected to grow to 25 schools.

Detailed plans for each of the schools were released in March after a months-long process in which the School District and the Mayor’s Office of Education sought community input on what residents wanted for their schools.

Susan Gobreski, community schools director in the Mayor’s Office, said that although all nine school communities wanted more access to behavioral health services, two placed particular emphasis on it: Kensington and William Cramp Elementary School in North Philadelphia.

The numbers tell part of the story, and those who work in the schools tell the rest.

“The gentrification that has taken place around us has not trickled down,” said Kensington principal James Williams.

In his school’s neighborhood, 36 percent of adults report having been diagnosed with a mental health condition; the Philadelphia average is 20 percent. Forty percent of the households are below the poverty line.

In Cramp’s neighborhood, 60 percent of the households are below the poverty line, double the city average.

“One of our zip codes is the largest in the nation in terms of reported cases of child sexual abuse,” Williams said.

Community schools officials talk about making the schools a safe refuge, but they see no high wall between what goes on inside the school and what goes on in the homes and streets where the children live the rest of the day.

For the coordinators like Romero, tying progress in the schools to that of the neighborhoods is vital.

“He’s connected to the community in a unique way,” said Williams, who will be leaving the school in the fall to take a job at the District office.

One day, he might be at the school, counseling students, and the next he might be knocking on parents’ doors or meeting with partner organizations such as the University of Pennsylvania or City Year.

School officials and counselors at Kensington and Cramp cite three main issues involving behavioral health in the schools: removing the stigma of seeking help, bringing more resources into the schools, and connecting parents with services outside the schools.

Cramp principal Deanda Logan sees headway being made on the first issue.

Parents “are asking and in some cases, they’re begging or beseeching us: ‘Please help,'’’ she said.

“You don’t have to be a doctor or a psychiatrist or a psychologist to see the need.”

Williams said, “It’s making seeking support part of the fabric of the school.”

Counselor Diane Finesmith said, “The students are much more willing to share and encourage others to share.”

Romero cited a recent poetry slam where the students shared details of their lives. “I’m amazed at their ability to share so much vulnerability,” he said.

Part of his job and that of Cramp community schools coordinator William Reed is improvising, drawing on outside partners, and making available resources go farther.

At Kensington, five University of Pennsylvania graduate students come to the school two or three days a week to counsel students under a grant from the Penn Futures project.

In addition to being close to the students’ ages, grad students Nicholas Allen and Ashley Valdez say their backgrounds are particularly helpful with a student body that is over half African American and Latino. Allen is biracial, and Valdez is bilingual.

At Cramp, Reed works with more than 60 community partners.

Curtis Institute, for example, has held violin lessons for 3- and 4-year-old Head Start children, who were provided instruments.

Neighboring Urban Hope Church donated $2,000 to help renovate the school library.

Counselor Joan Genaw brought the Center for Grieving Children in for an eight-week lunch-hour workshop for 4th and 5th graders who have lost family members.

The school has opened a parents’ room with computers, where Reed hopes to eventually hold computer and English classes.

But the move is already paying dividends. Luz Velez has a grandchild in kindergarten with ADHD and Delia Colon has a 3rd grader with the same diagnosis. Both said they had used the computers there to research it.

Getting parents more involved in the school can be harder than it sounds, principal Logan added. “Not everyone had a good experience in school when they were younger.”

Connecting parents with services that can’t be brought into the school is also a challenge.

“The services are out there,” said Kathy McClure, special education liaison at Kensington. “It’s telling parents where to go and what to do.”

Cramp counselor Genaw puts it this way: “I can tell someone to take your child to the [health] center for whatever and the parent’s going to say, ‘How do I get there? I have three other children to pick up and I have to get to my job.’”

Language can also be an issue in schools like Kensington and Cramp, where the enrollment is roughly 75 percent Latino.

Neither Logan nor Genaw speaks Spanish, but the School District will provide a bilingual counselor assistant two days a week next year instead of just one.

The school also requires that front office personnel, who greet parents, are native Spanish speakers. At Kensington, Romero and bilingual teacher Jim Hardy frequently are called in as interpreters.

And although it is still early in the project, Romero sees changes in the school’s atmosphere as a good start.

A lesson in responsibility

Antonio Romero’s father still drives a SEPTA bus, although not in Kensington.

And Romero, his suburban days behind him, still likes to recall his early lessons on the Number 3 bus, applicable now in the community schools program decades later:

“He didn’t want me to forget that there are two sides to every coin. That you had a responsibility to everyone around you.”

The city of Philadelphia hosted the National League of Cities’ Mayors’ Institute on Community Schools Tuesday, an event in which mayors from six cities met for an intense private problem-solving session about how community schools can improve health and educational outcomes for children.

Before the discussion, visiting mayors listened to opening remarks from Mayor Kenney and local education administrators.

The mayors met at the Rittenhouse Hotel in Center City. Among them were Sylvester Turner from Houston, Texas; Paula Hicks-Hudson from Toledo, Ohio; Garret Nancolas from Caldwell, Idaho; Dennis Michael from Rancho Cucamonga, California; and Tim Willson from Brooklyn Center, Minnesota.

Philadelphia’s chief education officer Otis Hackney also attended.

“We’re looking to thought leaders like all of you here today to help us learn the best practices so that we can be as successful as we possibly can be,” said Kenney during his opening remarks.

Through Philadelphia’s community schools initiative the mayor plans to transform 25 schools into neighborhood centers that will not only educate children, but also act as community hubs for a variety of medical and social services. The purpose is to help low-income children whose academic achievement is hindered by outside factors in their community.

According to the National Center for Community Schools, there are more than 5,000 community schools across the country.

In July 2016, the Kenney administration kicked off the initiative in Philadelphia with nine schools: Edward Gideon, Kensington Health and Sciences Academy, Southwark, William Cramp, William T. Tilden, Franklin S. Edmonds, James Logan, Murrell Dobbins, and South Philadelphia High School.

Deanna Gamble, communications director for the mayor’s office of education, said two more community schools will be added in July.

Almost a year after the initiative went into effect, Kenney said he is “tremendously proud” of the initiative’s progress.

Before beginning the discussion, the mayor also addressed the opposition to the soda tax, passed last year, which helps to fund the community school’s initiative.

“I decided that I can’t just wring my hands and say Harrisburg won’t help us, the federal government won’t help us,” Kenney said. “I had to find a revenue source.”

The mayors will continue their discussion through Thursday, during which time they will visit Gideon Elementary, a community school in Strawberry Mansion.

Fresh off a legal victory, Mayor Kenney visited Southwark School in South Philadelphia on Tuesday to honor the school's community partners and plug the city's community schools initiative.

The event came less than 24 hours after a Common Pleas Court judge dismissed a lawsuit seeking to invalidate Philadelphia's new tax on sweetened beverages. The ruling means that, at least for now, the programs Kenney plans to support with money from the tax can move forward unabated.

Among them is the city's plan to create 25 community schools over five years. The first nine schools were announced earlier this year, and this initial cohort is about to embark on the next phase of the process. After completing an assessment to gauge what school and community members feel they need, each school's designated coordinator will help create a strategic plan.

Those plans will detail the school's priorities. By early next year, each community school will have a sense of what outside services it wants and how much those services might cost. It's the job of each community school coordinator to work with city staff to find funding for those projects.

A lawsuit challenging Philadelphia’s new sweetened beverage tax was dismissed Monday in Common Pleas Court, which allows the Kenney administration to move ahead with an expanded prekindergarten program funded by the tax.

In addition to saying he will use the tax – often referred to as the soda tax – for the expansion of early childhood education, Mayor Kenney also wants to fund the rehabilitation of hundreds of recreation centers and playgrounds, subsidize 25 community schools, and equip police with body cameras. The tax is expected to raise $92 million over the next five years.

"Today is much more than a simple vindication of the legal principles on which the tax is based,” the mayor said in a statement. “It is a victory for Philadelphians, who have waited far too long for investment in their education system and in their neighborhoods.”

The dismissal is also a huge victory for the mayor, whose main policy fight during his first year was expanding prekindergarten through the soda tax.

The city plans to spend the first influx of revenue from the tax to pay for 2,000 new prekindergarten seats in January — 1,700 of which have already been filled as of last week.

The tax, which goes into effect Jan. 1, collects 1.5 cents per ounce of most sugary and diet beverages. Revenue is collected from distributors, not customers, although opponents contend that still means a price increase for customers.

If this entire cost is transferred to the customer, that would amount to 18 cents on a 12-ounce can. The tax applies to any non-alcoholic beverage with added sweetener, whether it’s natural or artificial: sodas, sports drinks, sweetened teas, and flavored waters.

City Council approved the tax in a 13-4 vote on June 16, after the beverage industry spent $10.6 million lobbying against it.

The lawsuit against the city was filed in September on behalf of the American Beverage Association and the lobby’s affiliates within the state and city. Several local soda sellers were also plaintiffs: John’s Roast Pork, City View Pizza, Metro Beverage of Philadelphia, and Days Beverages.

Kenney called on the beverage industry not to appeal to the state Supreme Court.

“I urge the soda industry to accept the judge’s ruling and do the right thing for the children of Philadelphia, many of whom struggle in the chilling grip of pervasive poverty,” Kenney said. “The industry has chosen not to challenge beverage taxes in other municipalities, and there is no reason to continue pursuing it here.”

However, Shanin Specter — a partner at Line & Specter who represents the plaintiffs — told the Philadelphia Business Journal that “we shall appeal,” in a one-line email.

The Philadelphians Against Grocery Tax Coalition, which represents members of the beverage industry involved in the case, told the Business Journal that it supports the plan to appeal.

“Regardless of their decision,” Kenney said, “the city will not stop pursuing what those kids need most – quality pre-K, community schools, and better parks, libraries and rec centers.”

Passage of the tax made Kenney the first mayor of a major U.S. city to pass a tax on sugary drinks. Since passage of the tax in Philadelphia, five jurisdictions have approved similar taxes: Boulder, Colorado; San Francisco, Oakland, and Albany, California; and Cook County, Illinois, which includes Chicago.

The lawsuit argued that the new tax is a sales tax and therefore cannot legally be applied as a separate tax — it would have to be altered by amending the sales tax. The suit also contended that the tax would violate the state constitution, which requires similar classes of people and products to be taxed at the same rate.

“The Judge upheld the key points of our argument,” City Solicitor Sozi Pedro Tulante said in a statement. “The Philadelphia Beverage Tax cannot be considered a sales tax, and neither does it violate the uniformity clause of the Pennsylvania Constitution.”

The lawsuit also contended that products that can be purchased through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, or food stamps) are exempt from sales tax, so taxing those purchases would violate state and federal law.

He ruled that the soda tax and the state sales tax are separate forms of taxation because the beverage tax is levied on the distributor and the sales tax is levied directly on the customer.

Glazer found as “not relevant” the plaintiff’s argument that distributors will pass on at least some of the tax to retailers, who will raise prices. He said that what matters is how the tax “operates, not what private actors will do in response to the tax to offset the burden.”

He also dismissed the plaintiff’s argument about food stamps, pointing out that it wouldn’t be customers with food stamps paying the tax, it would be the distributors.

In terms of the constitutional argument, Glazer ruled that the tax is “uniformly applied to distributors,” and therefore does not have to uniformly affect all customers and products.

As of last week, the administration had already spent roughly $200,000 on pre-K programs and has a $12 million expansion budgeted for the spring.

Through July 2020, the tax's proceeds will contribute about $41 million to the city’s fund balance and around $15 million to programs for youth homelessness and disability settlements. All other revenue will be used for expanding pre-K, funding community schools, and rehabilitating parks and recreation centers.

When starting a job, it’s always nice to hear some words of encouragement, especially when those words come from the mayor of Philadelphia.

Mayor Kenney greeted 17 of the city’s newest employees Wednesday, all of them hired to help carry out Philadelphia’s community schools initiative. The cohort gathered at a city office just north of Center City for the first installment of a six-day boot camp, after which they’ll be dispatched to schools around the city.

It was a giddy, ribbon-cutting sort of moment for Kenney, who has bet big on community schools and promises to create 25 of them over the next five years.

“I am so excited that you’re willing to do this. I really am,” he told the staffers. “I think you’re just wonderful people that want to do this. This is the height of public service.”

Kenny’s administration envisions community schools as a way to break the cycle of poverty. It’s also been framed by many as an antidote to the turnaround reform model, where schools undergo drastic staffing shake-ups, are converted into charters, or both.

Community schools are supposed to become hubs for services that can address the health and emotional needs of low-income children. Those needs, the mayor said, must be addressed before children can learn and prosper.

“That’s why this is one of the most critical positions that we’re gonna hire,” Kenny said. “You’re gonna be the intermediary, you’re gonna intercede in those problems that parents face, that teachers face, that neighborhoods face.”

Philadelphia named its first nine community schools in July. Each will get a site coordinator responsible for diagnosing the problems that plague each school and recruiting outside groups to help solve those problems. The coordinators will have the support of eight other specialists within the mayor’s community schools office.

The positions pay roughly $50,000 to $60,000 annually depending on prior experience, said Susan Gobreski, director of the city’s community schools initiative. The city will fund the effort with money collected from its new tax on sweetened beverages.

The new staffers will arrive at their schools shortly before the new school year begins, and little is expected to change immediately. The fall has been set aside for site coordinators to do needs assessments and craft strategic plans for each school, Gobreski said. Only by January will the schools begin to house new services or programs. Even then, Gobreski said, don’t expect a flood of fancy new toys.

“A community school is not a facility,” Gobreski said. “A community school is a way of doing things and a broader view of what needs to happen.”

Click here for a full profile of each community school from the mayor's Office of Education.

Edward Gideon Elementary/Middle School

Edward Gideon School is located in the Brewerytown section of Philadelphia. It has an enrollment of 328 students (95 percent African American, 2 percent Latino, and 3 percent other, with 56 percent of students living in poverty.

The school has a special education enrollment of nearly 15 percent and a pre-K program through Head Start. Gideon ranks 107 in academic achievement out of 140 elementary schools in the city.

Kensington Health Sciences Academy

Kensington Health Sciences Academy is one of three high schools that the Mayor’s Office of Education designated as community schools. It serves 442 students, 56 percent of whom are Latino.

About 18 percent of students are English language learners, and about 28 percent are in special education, according to the city’s press release.

The students are drawn from a community that has a poverty rate of over 30 percent and a child poverty rate of about 49 percent, according to the 2015 Community Health Assessment published by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health.

A quarter of adults reported “poor or fair health,” in the health assessment, according to a press release from the city.

The 2014-15 School Progress Report indicates that Kensington Health Sciences Academy ranks 67th out of 80 schools in Philadelphia for achievement – which include PSSA, Keystone Exams, ACCESS for ELLs, and reading assessments – and 16th out of 26 of its peers.

Southwark Elementary/Middle School

Southwark serves 660 students from kindergarten to 8th grade. Among these students, nearly half are English language learners, and about 10 percent are in special education.

Latino and Asian students each represent 37 percent of the student body.

The area where Southwark is located has over 23 percent of people living in poverty, according to the 2015 Community Health Assessment published by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health.

Southwark ranks 103rd out of 140 schools in Philadelphia in achievement, and 10th out of 11 of its peers, according to the 2014-15 School Progress Report.

Southwark has a pre-K program through Head Start.

William Cramp Elementary School

William Cramp School in Fairhill is open to students from kindergarten through 5th grade, and currently has 538 students enrolled. Latino students make up 79 percent of the student population.

The student population also includes 23 percent English language learners and about 13 percent special education students.

Cramp ranks 57th out of 59 schools in Philadelphia for achievement, and 20th out of 22 among its peers, according to the 2014-15 School Progress Report.

Cramp is located in a district with a poverty rate of 46 percent, and a childhood poverty rate of about 60 percent, according to the 2015 Community Health Assessment published by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health.

The press release states that 30 percent of adults in the community report “poor or fair health.”

Cramp has a pre-K program through Head Start.

William T. Tilden Middle School

Tilden Middle School, in Southwest Philadelphia, has 470 students between 5th and 8th grade. African American students constitute 86 percent of the student population. About 13 percent of students are English language learners and about 18 percent are in special education.

According to the 2014-15 School Progress Report, Tilden ranks 25th out of 35 schools in Philadelphia in achievement, and 6th out of 10 among its peers.

About 29 percent of people are living in poverty in the district where Tilden is located and about 38 percent of children there are living in poverty, according to the 2015 Community Health Assessment published by the Philadelphia Department of Public Health.

In the community, about 35 percent of adults reported “poor or fair health.”

Franklin S. Edmonds Elementary School

Edmonds Elementary School is located in West Oak Lane, where there is a 22 percent poverty rate. It has an enrollment of 486 students (89 percent African American, 2 percent Latino, and 8 percent other), of which 1 percent are English Language Learners and 19 percent are enrolled in special education. The school has a pre-K program available through Bright Futures, and ranks 28th in English, math, and science achievement out of 59 K-5 schools in the city.

James Logan Elementary School

James Logan Elementary School is located in the Logan section of Philadelphia, where there is a 22 percent poverty rate. It has an enrollment of 264 students (87 percent African American, 4 percent Latino, and 8 percent other), of which 1 percent are English language learners and 17 percent are enrolled in special education. The school has a pre-K program available through Head Start, and ranks 25th in English, math, and science achievement out of 59 K-5 schools in the city.

Murrell Dobbins CTE High School

Dobbins High School is in North Philadelphia, where there is a 58 percent poverty rate. It has an enrollment of 599 students (98 percent African American), of which 2 percent are English language learners and 16 percent are enrolled in special education. The school ranks 71st in English, math, and science achievement out of 80 high schools in the city.

South Philadelphia High School

South Philadelphia High School has an enrollment of 710 students (59 percent African American, 17 percent Asian, 13 percent Latino, and 9 percent White), of which 23 percent are English language learners, and 31 percent are enrolled in special education. The school ranks 60th in English, math, and science achievement out of 80 high schools in the city.

Mayor Kenney named Philadelphia’s first nine community schools Monday, officially launching his five-year plan to create 25 such schools.

The initiative was rolled out with much fanfare at a City Hall news conference that reinforced the central role that community schools will play in Kenney’s K-12 education agenda.

“I firmly believe that when we help our schools become stronger, our neighborhoods will get stronger, and this makes for a stronger city,” Kenney said.

The schools in Philadelphia’s inaugural class of community schools are Murrell Dobbins CTE High School, William T. Tilden Middle School, Kensington Health Sciences Academy, South Philadelphia High School, Edward Gideon Elementary/Middle School, Southwark Elementary/Middle School, F.S. Edmonds Elementary School, James Logan Elementary School, and William Cramp Elementary School. Together, the schools represent a wide cross-section of neighborhoods – from gentrifying South Philadelphia to some of the city’s poorest zip codes.

Community schools as a reform strategy have been pushed by Kenney with the support of City Council President Darrell Clarke and a coalition that includes the teachers’ union and several education advocacy groups. It is essentially the answer to the predominant school reform strategy of at least the past decade: the so-called “portfolio model” that has led to the creation of more charter schools.

The community schools approach calls for schools to become neighborhood centers for support services, almost like a cross between traditional schools and community centers. The central argument is that children – especially low-income children – face steep barriers outside the classroom that prevent them from learning, and that schools must address those barriers in order to eventually improve achievement.

“It’s about listening to the school community and bringing targeted resources directly into schools, making them thriving neighborhood hubs that support everyone in the community,” said Kenney.

Philadelphia is paying for its community schools initiative using money generated by the sweetened beverage tax, approved by City Council in June. Council set aside $4 million to fund the project this year, with more to come as the city adds more schools and as the real cost of integrating and expanding city services becomes clear. That works out to a little over $400,000 per school, although schools aren’t guaranteed a certain allotment of cash. Instead, each community school will receive a site coordinator responsible for assessing community needs and finding resources to help meet those needs.

Nearly half of the $4 million – about $1.6 million – has been earmarked for personnel. That includes the site coordinators and technical support staff who will work out of City Hall. Contracted services account for $1.75 million more, with just $400,000 total set aside for materials, supplies, and equipment. City officials say they hope the site coordinators will turn community schools into magnets for outside dollars.

“That will include balancing what philanthropic resources are available, what corporate partnerships are available, and what we’ll look at is what programs we need to expand in order to be able to get these services,” said Susan Gobreski, director for community schools with the mayor’s Office of Education.

The mayor’s office has been vague when explaining how it will measure the success of its community schools initiative. It has vowed to deemphasize – if not outright ignore –student test scores when evaluating the program. Officials have pointed instead to measures such as daily attendance and neighborhood buy-in. The city has also downplayed expectations in year one, describing it as a time to coordinate plans and make sure new initiatives are being rolled out with fidelity.

“We’ll be benchmarking implementation,” said Otis Hackney, who heads the mayor’s Office of Education.

Representatives of the state Department of Education were also present at Monday’s announcement.

Beth Olanoff, policy director for the Pennsylvania Department of Education, said that Secretary Pedro Rivera is a “strong supporter” of the community schools strategy.

“He always reminds us that students bring their whole selves to the classroom. Hunger, health issues, and safety concerns aren't left at the schoolhouse door,” she said. “Community schools offer significant promise in addressing these challenges.”

Rivera, who worked as a teacher and principal in Philadelphia and was also superintendent in Lancaster, would like to implement the strategy in other districts across the state.

George Jackson, representing Philadelphia Federation of Teachers president Jerry Jordan, said that poverty presents big challenges for schools and that teachers are forced to compensate by providing basic supplies themselves.

"Too often, we have opted to close or give away our neighborhood schools instead of actively working to remove the obstacles that stand between our schoolchildren and academic success,” Jackson said.

And the Philadelphia Coalition Advocating for Public Schools (PCAPS), also a longstanding community schools proponent, issued a statement calling the strategy “transformative” and praised the geographic diversity of the chosen schools and the commitment of the leadership in each one.

Of all the key players, the School District has been the least gung-ho about the initiative.

In his remarks, Superintendent William Hite thanked Clarke for having the idea and bringing it to fruition, given that the idea is to provide “critically important services for our schools and for our youth and for our communities.”

But the selected principals are thrilled, mostly because they will be getting services and resources that they and their students desperately need, as those in high-poverty areas struggle with the effects of trauma, poor physical health, food insecurity, and inadequate behavioral health services.

“I don’t think this is a complete solution to all our problems, but it will put us on a trajectory to build better families, better communities,” Damon said. “I’m standing here composed, but on behalf of my colleagues, I’m super excited.”

Later, she elaborated, saying that coordinating services to treat the “whole child” brings back “the village approach to raising children and supporting families.”

For instance, this year, one of her students was shot, which traumatized other students in the school.

“Families didn’t know where to go, so they came to me for help,” she said.

By making calls and reaching out, she was able to get extra counseling services. And although the student, thankfully, survived, he actually came to school the next day, which raised its own red flags. Damon felt strongly that he should be home recovering. So she took him home herself, talked to the family, and tried to get to the bottom of the incident, which she suspected was related to gang activity.

All this would have been easier to deal with if that kind of help was available right inside the school, she said, which would free up her mental energy and time to focus more closely on teaching and learning. (The student is attending college, Damon added.)

Dobbins, located at 21st and Lehigh Avenue, is a citywide Career and Technical Education (CTE) high school, where students must apply and meet certain criteria to get in. As such, it may seem like an odd choice for a community school. But it isn’t, said Gobreski. For one, as Damon’s story indicates, its students have many intense needs.

One of the city’s original “vocational” schools focusing on trades, it is housed in a seven-story building meant for thousands but now has barely 600 students. It was chosen in part because expanding access to and increasing the quality of CTE, as it is now called, is another priority of the Kenney administration, Gobreski said.

And even though its students don’t all live in its surrounding area, Dobbins “still plays a role and has relationships in its neighborhood,” she said. The school “has challenges that they need help with, and the neighborhood certainly needs help. What we were looking for were places that were demonstrating the capacity to do this, opportunities for neighborhood growth, and where this type of strategy can play a role.” Increasing the school’s enrollment by making it a more attractive place to attend was also a consideration.

Shauneille Taylor, principal of the 328-student, K-8 Edward Gideon School in the heart of North Philadelphia, said she is thrilled. Now, she said, she has to make phone calls and scout around for help when her students, for instance, come to school hungry, which is not a rare occurrence.

Her families “need behavioral health services, help with parenting skills, information on how to get a GED,” Taylor said. Making schools community hubs and offering social services in poor areas like Gideon’s will go a long way toward “leveling the playing field for all students and breaking the cycle of poverty,” she said.

Some of her families also lack adequate health care, she said. At her previous school, one of her students was found to suffer from sleep apnea. At Gideon, she was able to bring in experts from Children’s Hospital to train her staff to recognize symptoms of the condition in children. As a community school, Gideon will be able to make such training and programs routine and in-house.

The community schools approach, she said, “is not just putting on a Band-Aid,” but creating conditions for “healing the entire family.”

Principal James Williams of Kensington Health Sciences Academy took a broad view: It’s not just about having more services, but about sending a message to his students -- 56 percent of whom are Latino and 32 percent of whom are Black -- that they matter.

“It’s a social investment,” he said. “We have to say to one another that you are valued, and the community is going to invest resources in you. That is what kids need to hear.”

Mayor Kenney's Office of Education announced the first nine of 25 planned community schools at a press conference this morning. The first group of schools to be part of the new initiative will be:

William Cramp Elementary School, 3449 N. Mascher St.

Murrell Dobbins CTE High School, 2150 W. Lehigh Ave.

F.S. Edmonds Elementary School, 8025 Thouron Ave.

Edward Gideon Elementary School, 2817 W. Glenwood Ave.

Kensington Health Sciences Academy, 2463 Emerald St.

Logan Elementary School, 1700 Lindley Ave.

Southwark Elementary School, 1835 S. Ninth St.

South Philadelphia High School, 2101 S. Broad St.

Tilden Middle School, 6601 Elmwood Ave.

The Office of Education conducted surveys and meetings with Philadelphia residents as part of the school selection process. A report about the process released last week stated that a neighborhood's rate of child poverty and health issues, such as the prevalence of diabetes and asthma, should be the most important considerations in deciding which schools should become community schools. The most important school-based factor should be the willingness of the school's principal and staff to get on board, according to survey results outlined in the report.

The community schools initiative seeks to more seamlessly integrate city services into schools, from health care and adult education to out-of-school-time activities and support for English language learners. City officials in charge of the initiative say the goal is to create conditions in each school so that learning can take place. Steps to meet that goal would include improving communication and information-sharing between schools and city agencies, opening schools to the neighborhood, and placing services within the schools themselves.

A neighborhood's rate of child poverty and health issues, such as the prevalence of diabetes and asthma, should be the most important considerations in deciding which schools should become "community schools," according to a report from Mayor Kenney's Office of Education, based on surveys and meetings with Philadelphia residents.

The most important school-based factor should be the willingness of the school's principal and staff to get on board, according to survey results.

On Monday, the Office of Education plans to announce the first seven of 25 planned community schools.

The report, released on Wednesday, was based on contact with 750 people and 263 survey responses. The community schools initiative seeks to more seamlessly integrate city services into schools, from health care and adult education to out-of-school-time activities and support for English language learners. City officials in charge of the initiative say the goal is to create conditions in each school so that learning can take place. Steps to meet that goal would include improving communication and information-sharing between schools and city agencies, opening schools to the neighborhood, and placing services within the schools themselves.

"People shared their perspectives on the daunting set of responsibilities that are placed on schools to meet the many needs of children, and how the trauma of poverty afffects learning conditions," the report concludes. "We also heard about the effects of budget cuts on the capacity of schools and organizations to offer quality programs."

Respondents said they believe the effort is an opportunity to empower parents and community members and increase access and opportunities.

One goal is to increase awareness around "trauma-informed care" because so many students suffer the effects of growing up in neighborhoods plagued by extreme poverty, violence and family dysfunction.

Mayor Kenney has lobbied hard for community schools, even pledging a chunk of the revenue from his hard-fought sweetened-drinks tax to seed the initiative. That fight played out in public, defined by the fierce debate that so often attaches itself to big policy showdowns.

The community school selection process has been less public, partly by design. The mayor’s office doesn’t want the process to turn into a political frenzy.

It’s also indicative of the fact that the mayor’s office doesn’t have a set of rigid criteria for picking community schools. There’s no formula or set of weights that city officials are using to narrow the pool of candidates. And that’s not unique to Philadelphia. Across the country, there’s no real consensus on how cities should select community schools

“There really aren’t existing best practices out there,” said Della Jenkins, an analyst at Research for Action who recently co-wrote a report on community schools in practice.

Philadelphia’s selection process began late last year, before Kenney even took office. The School District of Philadelphia took a straw poll to see which District schools might be interested in becoming community schools. Roughly 50 expressed interest, said Susan Gobreski, director of community schools in the Mayor’s Office of Education.

In early spring, the School District invited schools for informational meetings on the initiative. By late May, 31 schools had formally applied.

Who applied? We don't know

The mayor’s office hasn’t released the formal list of applicants, but it’s offered some hints. Most are elementary schools, and most are located near the Broad Street corridor. North Philadelphia is well-represented, as is South Philly. There are a small handful of schools in Southwest Philadelphia and the Greater Northeast. Northwest Philadelphia has no representatives in the applicant pool.

When students return to Kensington Health Sciences Academy in September, they may be surprised to find a pharmacy in one of the old classrooms. It will be just one of many services and programs offered at the school as part of the new Health and Wellness Center that will open in the 2016-17 school year.

The wellness center will be a needed addition to the high school, said principal James Williams. According to Williams, Kensington Health Sciences Academy is located in one of the nation’s poorest congressional districts, and in a neighborhood that has a high number of reported cases of child sexual abuse. These conditions, Williams said, make it difficult for students to succeed academically because they can’t easily access the social and psychological services they need. So, instead, they have to miss school to try and handle things.

“When I look at the work I have to do in order to attempt to educate these kids, I’ve got to pull out all the stops, as far as I’m concerned,” Williams said.

In addition to a pharmacy, the center will include a health and wellness clinic, where students will receive annual physicals and risk assessments. The assessments will provide information, for example, about a student’s risk of getting involved in drug use or becoming pregnant. From these assessments, staff at the center will be able to point students to services that will best meet their needs.

“ One of [the clinic’s] goals will be to teach all students here in this school – with the other classes that are here – healthy choices so they can have a long, healthy life.”

The idea for the center – which will be housed in a converted classroom on the first floor of the high school – is the result of partnerships with CVS Health, St. Christopher’s Hospital, and the University of Pennsylvania.

The center will cost $250,000, said Nelson, with funding being provided by CVS Health, the Mayor’s Office, and the School District of Philadelphia.

CVS partnered with Kensington Health Sciences Academy after extensive conversations and a vetting process of more than a year. Nelson said the partnership came about because CVS Health found that it shared with the school leadership a vision for educating students about living healthy lives and preparing them for the workforce.

“It’s the vision in how all of [those services and programs] directly relates to workforce development ... turning a community that traditionally, for many generations now, have been recipients of tax dollars, turning them into taxpayers and successful people, and into a successful community,” Nelson said.

CVS has also offered Kensington Health Sciences Academy $150,000 a year to make the center “financially sustainable,” Williams said. In addition to funding, CVS will also provide Kensington students, who are already preparing for careers in the health sciences, with an unpaid internship, with the potential of being hired for a paid externship.

Staffing for the center will come from CVS, St. Christopher’s Hospital, the health-care provider for the center, and the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education and School of Social Policy and Practice. Teachers and interns from the University of Pennsylvania will work as counselors in the center, providing students with behavioral and mental health services. The school nurse will also work in the center.

Kensington Health Sciences Academy has not officially been designated as a community school, which generally includes a family-service center for the neighborhood that provides access to primary care physicians, vision and dental services, and behavioral health and counseling supports. But with the new center, it will have elements of one.

“They’re really on the leading edge of this type of strategy for envisioning how schools can play a role in the community,” said Susan Gobreski, community schools director in the Mayor’s Office of Education.

Mayor Kenney, who has been a proponent of the community schools concept, plans to create 25 community schools over the next four years.

Though community schools are created to serve the entire community, the center at Kensington Health Sciences Academy will be open only to its students.

“We’re not necessarily focusing on the community needs [right now],” said Williams. “Our focus for our effort is what my students need.”

But the needs of the larger impoverished community are not lost on Williams and Nelson. There are plans to open a $10 million center in a vacant lot across the street from the school to provide the same types of services that will be offered at the school’s center. Williams and Nelson said that this would be a “community-based health center” that offers services and training to members of the community.

Isaiah Gonzalez, a senior and student in the dental program at Kensington Health Sciences Academy, said that he hopes the center will “bring awareness” to students about how to live a healthy life.

“I feel like a lot of students here, and not only that, just a lot of people, they … don’t know how to take care of their bodies and things like that,” Gonzalez said.

Hakeem Thompson, a junior in the dental program, said: “I think it will help a lot of kids out.”

As Williams walked through the hallways greeting students, he beamed as he talked about what the center will accomplish.

In Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera, supporters of the community schools concept in Pennsylvania have an enthusiastic advocate in state government. Rivera was a keynote speaker at last week’s conference of the Coalition for Community Schools in Albuquerque, N.M., attended by 1,700 participants, including about 70 from Pennsylvania.

“Our vision for the commonwealth moving forward is really going to support the community schools movement in amazing ways,” Rivera said. He applauded Mayor Kenney’s push for community schools in Philadelphia and pointed to activity in Pittsburgh, Erie, Lancaster, the Lehigh Valley, and other smaller communities around the state.

In his speech, during a meeting with conference participants from Pennsylvania, and in an interview, Rivera detailed a number of ways that he and Gov. Wolf’s administration are trying to advance a community schools strategy.

He is creating a new position in the Department of Education called “special assistant of internal and external partnerships,” so there will be dedicated leadership at the state level supporting school-community partnerships and community schools work.

The state’s school report card, the School Performance Profile, which is now “heavily weighted toward standardized test performance,” will be revamped by Rivera and his staff, who are working with the General Assembly to do so. He says that once the state gives more weight to other factors, such as attendance and access to high-quality programs, schools will be encouraged to take a more holistic approach to student needs. “Schools are so focused on this test-taking culture because it’s what we measure,” he said. “As we start to change what we assess, partnerships will become a better answer.”

Rivera said that community perspectives will inform the effort to develop a state plan for implementing the Every Student Succeeds Act, the federal successor to the No Child Left Behind law. More than 400 stakeholders from across the state have nominated themselves to participate over the next year in the development of Pennsylvania’s plan, which will address four areas: teacher certification, educator effectiveness, assessment, and school accountability.

Across state government, Wolf administration departments are looking to address education issues. Each state department was asked to identify three goals, and “31 of those goals are education goals. … All of those goals probably align with the work that you’re doing,” Rivera told the Pennsylvania conference participants. One recent example of cross-agency collaboration is the Health Department’s work with the Department of Education on ensuring that children are fully immunized, using mobile immunization clinics.

Rivera said the department hopes to provide policy supports for efforts like the Kenney administration’s initiative to implement 25 community schools in Philadelphia, and he is in frequent contact with the mayor and his staff. “We will make ourselves available and be good partners.” He said that the state is providing more information about best practices on the Pennsylvania Department of Education website about state standards. And he pledged to work closely with the statewide network of community schools advocates that convened at the conference.

Rivera said state support for community schools should be extended to charter schools as well as traditional district schools: “We should support good charter schools.”

Rivera described the evolution of his thinking about community schools as rooted in his experiences as a teacher and principal in Philadelphia who realized that he needed to enlist help to mitigate the effects of poverty on his students. For many children, things as basic as the cost of doing laundry or finding transportation to school were obstacles to learning.

Later, as a superintendent in Lancaster, he said, he forged partnerships with outside organizations and businesses – and canceled ineffective ones – emphasizing that he wanted groups to help with “what they did well.” Partners provided food assistance, health care, vision care, and family mental health services in many schools, aligning their services with one another and with community needs. Through that work, Rivera said, “I became a student of the community schools movement.”

“There is no one, cookie-cutter approach to community schools,” Rivera said, stressing that schools must differentiate based on the needs of the particular community. But one essential principle is the power of partnerships, taking an “all-hands-on-deck” approach to building community support and engagement.

“Our schools should be focused on teaching and learning,” Rivera told conference participants. “We know that schools can’t teach and deliver effective instruction if students are hungry … if children are not healthy … if they’re having social and emotional needs … if children are worrying where are they going to sleep that night.

“We have to involve and invite every stakeholder to the table and ask that they focus on what they do best to improve what happens in the classroom and in the school.”

Susan Gobreski and Holly Gonzales were among more than a dozen Philadelphians who traveled to Albuquerque last week for the three-day national conference of the Coalition for Community Schools.

They joined more than 1,700 participants from around the country involved in the strategy of building schools as community hubs. These schools forge partnerships to address not only academics, but also health and family services, as well as youth and community development and engagement.

Gobreski and Gonzales are director and deputy director for community schools in the Mayor’s Office of Education. Under Chief Education Officer Otis Hackney, they are charged with launching and managing Mayor Kenney’s initiative to implement the community schools approach at 25 public schools in the city over the next four years. Last month, the office began to lay out its implementation plan.

Appointed in February, Gobreski previously led the advocacy group Education Voters of Pennsylvania. Gonzales recently moved to Philadelphia from Baltimore, where she worked for the Family League of Baltimore, a nonprofit that coordinates 55 community schools there.

They spoke with former Notebook editor and publisher Paul Socolar at the close of the conference. Here is an edited version of the conversation.

Why did you come to this conference?

Susan Gobreski: To learn about what’s happening in other places as we get ready to launch our new initiative. It’s really important to hear what’s worked and what hasn’t worked, what lessons there are, and to borrow good ideas.

Talk about the Philadelphia contingent.

Gobreski: We had teachers, community organizations, organizations that are doing work to build community schools strategies in different parts of the city, like the Netter Center at Penn. One thing stressed here is the importance of collaboration – of lots of different people at the table, and different perspectives, but working together.

What were the big takeaways?

Gobreski: That you don’t skip over bringing people together and doing a significant needs assessment from the ground up. And the idea of partners – all hands on deck.

The other thing that really seems to be important is that at the school level – everybody is working toward the goals of the school. If the principal and the teachers have said reducing absenteeism is what we’re focusing on, the community partners need to be actively engaged with the educators and their goals.

This is where the national mind is – about what we need to do to meet the needs of children in school settings. There’s a huge opportunity here.

The conference reflected that. Turnout was great. There was representation from urban districts and rural districts, from different states with different structures. This approach is working in a lot of different places. Clearly that’s because it’s adaptive.

There is a substantial body of work on community schools nationally. How do you take advantage of that?

Gobreski: With Holly, we have someone who has done this work in another place, Baltimore. That’s a great asset.

Holly Gonzales: There’s a lot that’s been written, and the Coalition for Community Schools is committed to sharing best practices, helping people learn from each other. What I love about this conference is that everybody is so excited to share with you, every session you go to. You can ask people for copies of their engagement materials – or their data-sharing plan.

We can tap into the body of work around community schools, and we can tap into the people who are doing the work. Events like this make both those things possible.

Holly, you’re new to the team in Philadelphia.

Gonzales: I had worked in Philadelphia before, with the Out-of-School-Time Network. I left to go to Baltimore, when they were launching their community school initiative. Having worked with community partners, I was excited about this model, which aligns partners more strategically and takes afterschool from an afterthought to being an integrated part of how schools and communities are operating.

When I heard that Mayor Kenney wanted to launch a community schools network, after my three years of doing that in Baltimore, I was excited. I believe the city is the right level of intervention – citywide systems of supports are what can help all of those programs – and help families and community members get the opportunities that they want. Cities are what you want to affect and change. Community schools do that, but at a localized and neighborhood level.

At the conference, was it noteworthy that Pennsylvania Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera was one of the keynote speakers and the Pennsylvania participants were able to meet together and with him?

Gobreski: The fact that he was here says a lot about where we’re headed as a state. The conversation that state leaders were able to have with him was very helpful in thinking about what structures we need – how we build the capacity and knowledge base and network at the state level.

It’s exciting to hear that the Department of Education is engaging other state departments about what their role in supporting education is. That’s exactly what we’re doing in the city.

Gonzales: It’s also great that we are able to tap into other local community school networks in Pennsylvania that are dealing within the same set of guidelines from the state Department of Ed. That context is really important when you’re trying to figure out how to do the work.

Are there things you’ll be doing as a result of the conference?

Gonzales: There are good resources we now have for setting up needs assessments, and there are resources we can share with community schools on how to do some of the work – to inform them, not to tell them how to do it.

I want to follow up with people from New York City about their rollout of community schools – about the lessons they learned and some of the things they wished they did.

Gobreski: The big actionable step is that we are building a toolkit so that we have pieces in place – so we can move to implementation. There are huge professional development opportunities and resources for coordinators, for partners, for teachers and principals. There are resources we can start to put in people’s hands, as opposed to having to start from scratch.

You’re aiming to launch five to seven community schools this year. What should people be expecting to hear from your office in the next couple of months?

Gobreski: We need parents at the table – and community members, and civic associations. We need the educators. It should not be a narrow set of people weighing in. We are committed to do as broad engagement as we can.

We’re looking for feedback on criteria for community schools. We’re looking for feedback on implementation. We’re making sure people are helping to think about both the problems and the solutions.

We’re getting invited to a lot of community meetings, which is great. We’re planning some brown bag lunches – they actually might be at different parts of the day; they might be after school. We want to make sure we’re available to people.

You can find the Mayor’s Office of Education on the city website. We’re also on Twitter: @PHL_MOE. We’ll be doing social media communication. People can sign up for an email list from the Mayor’s Office of Education to hear about the work on community schools.

Any final thoughts?

Gobreski: This administration is committed to getting kids what they need. The first part of that is making sure we’re doing a good job of identifying what people need. This is not some big city program. This is a strategy.

Gonzales: It’s really targeted to the needs – it’s very specific.

Gobreski: I just can’t stress enough: We want to build this together. The community perspective is the perspective that matters most.

Gonzales: When it comes to implementation, it’s the community that does the implementing. It’s us putting a structure in place to support and help implementation.

Otis Hackney knows that it’s one thing to find success as a leader and quite another to create a system that helps other leaders succeed.

But that’s one of his tasks as Mayor Kenney’s top education aide: to assist neighborhood school leaders in getting the same results he got at South Philadelphia High School, where graduation rates rose by double digits in his five years as principal.

For others to replicate that success is no small task, Hackney said. It will require creativity, discipline, and the sensitivity needed to create not just a set of rules, but a true school culture.

“I was walking through the courtyard in City Hall and I saw about 20 of my former students, coming from the Flower Show,” Hackney said. “And they said, ‘We miss you! We miss you for Town Halls.’ I said, ‘Y’all miss me yelling at you and telling you to come to school on time?’ They said, ‘It’s not the same. They still kind of do it, but we miss when you do it.’”

Hackney, whose title is chief education officer, is the point man for the Kenney administration’s priority to turn Philadelphia’s neighborhood schools into “community schools” that network with neighborhood groups and institutional partners to offer social, health, recreational and other services to students and their families.

He won the job on the strength of his work at Southern, where from 2010 to 2015 he brought in a range of community school techniques, helping stabilize what had been an embattled, violence-plagued school.

“That’s one of the major factors in why I was chosen to do this work,” Hackney said.

Holding weekly Town Halls to reinforce expectations for the entire student body was just one tactic. He also relied on strong internal data management, careful coordination among partners, and constant review and assessment of staff and partners to hold them accountable.

During his time there, enrollment increased, attendance improved, and the graduation rate went from 48 percent to about 62 percent – close to the citywide average.

“Many people would never believe that Southern [graduation rates] could be that high. It’s about maximizing every resource at your disposal,” he said.

Different approaches

Hackney doesn’t expect other schools to replicate Southern’s success without funding that is dedicated to the task.

This year, the Kenney administration has asked City Council for about $4 million to plan and launch a half-dozen community schools this summer. They hope for an estimated $39.5 million over five years to create a total of about 25.

“We need a budget,” Hackney said. “You can’t take a one-off from one Philadelphia school and say, ‘we can replicate that without resources.’ Resources matter.”

But principals will have wide leeway to organize their partnerships and lead their schools as they see fit, Hackney said. Their challenge will be to constantly adjust practices, even as they keep expectations consistent – for staff, providers, and students alike.

“You can argue with me [as a principal] over a rule,” said Hackney. “But you can’t win an argument with me over my expectations. You can argue about when schools start. But you can’t argue with my expectation that you come to school on time.”

As Hackney takes his post, the Kenney administration and the District are pursuing two distinctly different strategies for improving school performance.

Broadly speaking, the District’s vision for “turnarounds” is to focus on management reforms, staff turnover, and classroom changes. They want principals to be able to pick new staff who “buy in” to new approaches, including data-heavy classroom techniques.

The Kenney administration’s focus is on providing existing school staffs with new supports through the community schools model.

External partners – such as those who can help with behavioral health, family, and legal issues – can free staff to focus on academics, Hackney said. Union work rules and contract constraints aren’t an obstacle, he believes, as long as principals give teachers the right leadership, resources, and working environment.

“You don’t have to ask them to go above and beyond,” Hackney said. “I’d say, I just need you here from 7:50 to 2:54. Anything beyond that is appreciated … [but] I need you to do a great job in between the bells.”

A focus on high schools

The District’s turnaround model also has focused primarily on elementary schools. Its “Promise Academy” model for neighborhood high schools has been underfunded and uneven. Meanwhile, it has created a host of new high schools, both District and charter.

But traditional neighborhood high schools remain at the core of the District’s portfolio. They educate about 19,000 students, about as many as attend charter high schools. Neighborhood high schools enroll over half the total number of students in District-run high schools.

Their challenges are unique because their responsibilities are unique: As schools of last resort, they must take any student from their catchment who does not succeed elsewhere and must accept new students constantly throughout the year.

That means they get the students who are hardest to keep on track to graduate. A recent report from the advocacy group Public Citizens for Children & Youth, Separate but Unequal, found that neighborhood high schools have disproportionately high numbers of special education students, English language learners, and students involved with the Department of Human Services.

They’ve also been hit hardest by the ongoing fiscal crisis, PCCY found, having “the highest rate of principal and teacher turnover” and “the most significant reductions in staffing.”

Among the report’s findings:

• Neighborhood high schools have had an average of four or more principals since 2009.

• Neighborhood high schools have lost more teachers than any other school type, with 400 positions eliminated between 2010 and 2014.

• Almost half of neighborhood high schools – nine – have no assistant principal.

• More than half the neighborhood high schools’ counselors were laid off over four years, from a total of 91 in 2010 to just 35 in 2014.

All that leaves staff and principals badly overstretched and leaves students with little incentive or support to stay on track to graduation, Hackney said.

“Students in high school now only know schools from a deficit model,” he said. “They haven’t been to a school that’s rich and robust with programs, with staff, with opportunities.”

Simple techniques, rigorously applied

To Hackney, reversing that trend is daunting, but not impossible.

The practices he followed at Southern – collecting data, building networks, monitoring progress, and making adjustments – are straightforward. But they must be rigorously and consistently followed, he said. As a principal, Hackney would:

• Constantly update his student roster so that he knew exactly when students were enrolling or departing.

The central goal, Hackney said, is to maintain accountability, reminding staff, providers and students of their role in sustaining the school’s mission and culture. The provider meetings, for example, gave staff and the partners a chance to compare notes and work together, and ensured that everyone was performing to expectations.

“It was a healthy environment,” Hackney said. “It wasn’t a competitive thing. … It was, ‘How can we cross-collaborate and do better?’ Especially since you’re serving some of the same children.”

Such work needs manpower. Much of the budget requested by the Kenney administration will go to add a “resource manager” in every school, who would handle much of the planning, parent and community outreach, and fundraising.

Principals will need those managers to be on top of their games, Hackney said. “You should be one less thing for me to worry about – not one more,” he said. “I already have too many things to do.”

Kenney administration officials say they’ll pick the initial cohort of community schools soon. They hope to have the first resource managers in place by the summer, networking, fundraising, and lining up partners and supports of all kinds.

And while such managers will give schools a big boost, Hackney said, principals will also quickly find that keeping students moving toward graduation requires more than a few new programs. It requires a schoolwide effort to define and maintain a culture of learning that’s healthy for everyone.

No test can measure for this kind of culture, but “kids can sense when it exists,” Hackney said. “We have to get to a place where we can say, ‘This is how we teach. This is our approach with children.’ And it has to survive administrations.”

Fifty years of experience as an organizer, advocate, and educator at the local, state and national levels has convinced me that a school serving students and families who live in concentrated poverty cannot be successful unless it uses the Community School Strategy … period … full stop.

A Community School:

Is a place where strategic partnerships among the school and community resources support student achievement, positive conditions for learning, and the well-being of families and communities.

Maintains a core focus on children while recognizing that they are part of a family and their families are part of unique communities.

Builds an integrated strategy that enhances academics and student well-being through enrichment, health and social supports, family engagement, and youth and community development.

Is anchored by the work of a full-time site coordinator and expanded school hours.

Provides a base for parent and community advocacy on behalf of their children.

The Community School Strategy is NOT another program alongside other programs. It is a way of thinking about school, students, families, and the wider community that harnesses the assets of each, in a classic sense making the whole greater than the sum of the parts. The full-time coordinator is a vital part of the school leadership team, the equivalent of a vice principal. Everyone understands that the strategy is essential if their students are to learn to read and do math competently. It’s not another thing for the principal to do, but something she or he must understand and embrace to do everything else.

The Community School Strategy is not a silver bullet. Good teachers and school leadership, adequate instructional materials, decent facilities, and quality early childhood programs are essential. Nevertheless, a school can have these other characteristics and still fail to help its students thrive.

Children cannot learn if they are hungry, have aching teeth, can’t see clearly, have no place to do their homework, feel unsafe in their community or at home, or lack the cultural, social and physical enrichment opportunities after school and on weekends.

The school cannot deliver these opportunities by itself but must have engaged families, neighbors and partners in the broader community. With the commitment of the principal, teachers, and daily management and outreach by a community school coordinator, robust partnerships deliver the tailored supports required. It is not a one-size-fits-all approach. Students, families and neighborhoods have unique assets and needs. And, for every dollar spent on this core strategy, $3 is leveraged in critical programs and opportunities for students and families. That’s part of its beauty.

Outstanding performance confirms the strategy’s effectiveness. At the school level, no one has done it better than a neighborhood school, Wolfe Street Academy, in Baltimore City, one of 54 community schools in the city. It has a 96 percent poverty level, and 80 percent of its students speak a language other than English at home. Ten years ago when the school adopted the Community School Strategy, it ranked 77th among Baltimore's 125 elementary schools in academic performance. Last year, it was second, trailing only one of the most affluent schools in the city.

Wolfe has outstanding teachers, parents and leadership in its principal (I’m proud to say my son Mark is now in his 11th year as principal at Wolfe Street and community school coordinator Connie Phelps in her 10th year). It has 25 partners, including the Maryland Food Bank, the University of Maryland Dental School and School of Social Work, Johns Hopkins University Medical School, a neighborhood theater, a local dance studio, and the Baltimore Ravens football team. They start every school day with a morning meeting of students, staff, and parents. Routinely, up to a quarter of the parents attend, many eating breakfast with their children.

At the state level is Kentucky’s 26 years of experience. In 1990, I had the honor of working with their legislature to design a new statewide education system. A central component was a commitment of funds and resources to make every school with 20 percent or more of students living in poverty a community school. The core component of Kentucky’s community schools (called Family Resource Centers at the elementary level and Youth Service Centers at the secondary level) is having full-time people to coordinate the services and recruit community partners that they leverage on behalf of the students. As at Wolfe Street, the full-time staff in Kentucky make the connections to provide food, clothing, dental, physical and mental medical support, and other wrap-around resources through a multitude of partners.

Given the depth of Kentucky’s poverty, 93 percent of all Kentucky students now attend a community school. The result? In only one generation, the state has moved from nearly dead last among the 50 states -- 48th -- to 33rd, based on multiple attainment and achievement factors combined into a single index by the University of Kentucky.

These are the compelling reasons that a bill has been introduced in the Maryland General Assembly this year that would build the funding into the state education formula for a full-time community school coordinator and an afterschool program at every school in the state in which 40 percent or more of its students are eligible for free and reduced-price meals. That’s 833 schools (58 percent) that will serve 441,000 of the state’s students (50 percent).

Why would we do this?

We know it works.

It improves educational performance.

It makes economic sense.

It’s good politically.

It’s the right thing to do.

In an aside, the reasoning behind community schools is precisely the same as our thinking for Family Resource Networks during my tenure as Philadelphia’s superintendent. That was just after Kentucky had taken its bold vision to reality. The difference was that we did not have the resources for the full version, so we had to settle for simply realigning existing resources. I am delighted that Philadelphia is now moving in the direction of a more robust commitment to meeting the needs of its children.

David Hornbeck was the superintendent of schools in Philadelphia from 1994 to 2000.

Mayor Kenney’s first major policy announcement centered on plans to develop 25 community schools across Philadelphia. As is the case with any ambitious policy proposal, the “how” will take time. The “what” and “why” are more clear: By providing extended learning opportunities and access to additional services – such as preventive health care, counseling, and quality early education – community schools strive to address the effects of poverty on academic performance and provide more comprehensive supports for traditionally underserved students and families.

At the same time, research tells us that initial effects of community schools are small and that program quality matters enormously when it comes to outcomes.

So, what can Philadelphia learn from the experiences of other districts that have invested in the community schools approach with varying results?

First, as the name underscores, the development of any true community school model must start with the right partners around the table, including educators, neighborhood leaders, parents, and service providers from across the city. Too often policymakers pay lip service to community input without providing a substantive and accessible process by which neighborhoods can determine their own needs and have a voice in how best to address them.

In addition, planning for community schools should engage a diverse group of funders from both the public and private sectors in conversations about sustainability from the start. Community schools that rely entirely on public funds will be at the mercy of changing financial conditions and administrative priorities. On the other hand, models seeded by substantial external, private funding will be at risk when transitions in funding priorities or partner staff occur. Creating a durable community school presence in Philadelphia will require a mix of resources: public funds (city, state, and federal), private support, and payments in lieu of taxes from nonprofit organizations, including higher education and the city’s health-care sector. Homewood Children’s Village Community Schools in Pittsburgh provides an example of an urban community schools model that has been supported by a diverse array of funders, both public and private.

Because community schools will need to rely on long-term partnerships and external investments, it will be essential to establish shared and transparent expectations about both short- and long-term goals and the benchmarks and outcomes that will be used to measure them. As researchers at an organization with more than two decades of experience evaluating complex educational reform initiatives, we know first-hand that it is vital to establish a robust evaluation plan that focuses on implementation, provides plenty of feedback loops to refine the model, and accurately tracks realistic indicators of effectiveness.

In the first few years of implementation, goals might address the integration of the community school model within each site and participation among students and their families. If the initiative is seen as external to the school instead of central to the culture, it will not be able to work in partnership with teachers and administrators or recruit students and families to access needed services. The transition from school to comprehensive community hub requires a significant shift in mission and practice. Ongoing formative feedback from an external evaluator could help to provide perspective to schools and service providers on whether these foundational steps take place.

Next, changes in student behavior will be the building blocks for academic success. Examples of behavioral change might include decreases in chronic absenteeism and suspension rates, and increases in health-care visits and participation in afterschool activities. Short-term benchmarks that measure these behavior changes help demonstrate incremental progress and should be balanced with long-term outcomes-based goals and a realistic timeline that takes into account the depth of the challenge. Significant change in academic performance would be considered a long-term goal, and school-wide standardized test scores are only one potential measure.

Ultimately, if policymakers are to embrace a community school model, they would be wise to also embrace a diverse set of non-academic outcomes related to student and school success. Transparency about expectations for progress and the measures that will be used to document it can help partners, funders, and the public understand the opportunities and challenges inherent in evaluating and sustaining strong community schools.

As Philadelphia’s process begins, key players are showing a heartening awareness of the importance of inclusive planning, shared goals, and transparent metrics. The experiences of other districts demonstrate that getting off on the right foot is the best foundation for the long-term success of community schools.

Mark Duffy and Della Jenkins are researchers at Research for Action, an independent, Philadelphia-based nonprofit organization that focuses on education research and evaluation.

Susan Gobreski, executive director of Education Voters PA, will join the Mayor's Office of Education as community schools director.

Mayor Kenney will make the announcement today.

Gobreski is a longtime public education advocate who, at Education Voters PA, has advocated for fair and adequate state education funding.

Kenney has said that he wants to create 25 community schools in Philadelphia -- schools that serve as neighborhood hubs, offering health, social, recreational, civic, and cultural services to families and children. Community schools rely heavily on establishing partnerships with organizations and service providers to operate within school buildings.

The concept has shown some success in other cities, including Cincinnati, and has been enthusiastically embraced by Kenney, City Council President Darrell Clarke, and the teachers' union as a counter-strategy to closing traditional neighborhood schools and expanding charters.

But there is no single blueprint. Part of Gobreski's task will be to define exactly what a community school in Philadelphia looks like and how to make each one responsive to its particular neighborhood.

Paying for them will also be a challenge – most of the cost in other cities has generally come out of the city budget, rather than the school budget. Making them effective will require a high level of cooperation among city agencies – and between the city and the District – that historically has been hard to achieve in Philadelphia.

“Susan’s longstanding commitment to improving our city’s schools coupled with her expertise in community engagement made her an obvious choice for this role,” said Kenney in a statement. “Her insightful policy ideas and ability to bring diverse stakeholders together around common goals is exactly what we need to make community schools successful.”

In an interview, Gobreski said that there is now a consensus in the city on the strategy.

"Multiple people from multiple sectors have agreed this is the way forward," said Gobreski. "This strategy allows us to look at big issues like poverty, to look more comprehensively on how we deliver services. It's about meeting children where they are and focusing on what specific people need. This is what we have to do."

She said that this represents a concerted effort by the Kenney administration to look at "how to align resources to support city schools. That is going to require participation from multiple agencies and parts of city government, but it’s all one city, and all of our kids are all of our kids. That’s the job."

To critiques that the community schools strategy does not focus on academics, Gobreski said that it is about creating conditions that make it easier for the District to do the work of improving teaching and learning.

"It is really about how the city and community supports children and supports educators," she said. "The educators focus on the academics."

On the issue of the potential cost, she said, "The question has always been, 'What do kids need and what does it take to give them what they need?' We're going to have to figure out costs and where there are opportunities and synergies as well. We are at the beginning of looking at a new way to meet our needs and obligations."

Gobreski has previously served as president of Planned Parenthood of Pennsylvania Advocates, Pennsylvania state director and then national campaign director for the League of Conservation Voters, and organizer and regional director for Clean Water Action. She currently serves on the Temple University Political Science Advisory Board and was a Education Policy and Leadership Center/Institute for Educational Leadership Fellow.

She has a bachelor's degree in political science from Temple University and is completing her master’s degree in urban education policy there. She and her husband, a Philadelphia public school teacher, have three children. One is in college, and two attend Philadelphia public schools.

Gobreski will start her new job in mid-February. Susan Spicka, who has been advocacy coordinator for Education Voters Pennsylvania, will serve as interim leader.

With the election of Jim Kenney as mayor and Helen Gym as a City Council member, there is a new dynamic at City Hall regarding education policy.

Kenney is prioritizing work toward universal preschool, which has been a focus of the Nutter administration. But the mayor-elect has also thrown his support behind community schools as the primary reform strategy for the District.

And he named a highly regarded principal of a neighborhood high school, Otis Hackney, to be his chief education officer.

Under Hackney's leadership since 2010, South Philadelphia High School has put together perhaps the most advanced effort in the city to implement the community school model, which involves re-envisioning schools as accessible, full-service centers for students and their families. Kenney says he wants to create 25 community schools citywide.

Just two weeks after the election, Kenney, Hackney, and City Council President Darrell Clarke traveled to Cincinnati to learn more about how that city has used this strategy as a way to revitalize district-run neighborhood schools.

That is a shift from Mayor Nutter's approach. Over eight years, Nutter oversaw a substantial expansion of charters, while advancing the goal of having “a great school,” District-run or otherwise, in every neighborhood. In embracing the community schools strategy, Kenney has quickly found common cause with Clarke, who consistently clashed with Nutter on education issues.

Gym rode to Council on the strength of her education activism, in which she has been severely critical of the District and city policy of closing schools, growing charter enrollment, and using mostly test scores to decide which schools are candidates for turnaround and privatization. Gym was the leading vote-getter among Council at-large candidates.

Gym reiterated during her campaign that the “great schools” strategy is misguided in that it promotes the creation of “islands of greatness in oceans of inequity.”

Both Kenney and Gym received robust and unequivocal support from the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, which is currently at war with the District administration. Teachers have not had a new contract or a raise in over three years, and in the face of stalemated talks, the School Reform Commission sought in October 2014 to nullify the contract entirely. The matter is now in court. The union’s relationship with Nutter soured as budget cuts and the contract dispute deepened.

In his first major policy announcement since winning election, Philadelphia Mayor-elect Jim Kenney formalized a campaign promise to create 25 "community schools" over the next four years.

Before a sea of schoolchildren and TV cameras in the gymnasium of North Philadelphia's Tanner Duckrey Elementary, Kenney told students Monday that the initiative would help give them "the ability to reach your potential in your life."

The event comes after Kenney's trip to Cincinnati last week, where he and Council President Darrell Clarke took a first-hand look at a district that's prioritized a community school model that includes health and social services in neighborhood schools.

Kenney and Clarke aim to replicate that model in Philadelphia, creating "school-based family service centers." They envision schools as hubs of health care – with access to primary care physicians, vision and dental services, as well as behavioral health and counseling supports.

These schools would also offer child care and after-school services.

Kenney says his goal is achievable with a relatively small investment – estimating an $8 million annual price tag.

"We deliver services every day from the City of Philadelphia through our operating budget. What we're talking about is repurposing those services into school-based models so that we can listen to the principals and teachers, so they can let us know what they know about their schools and what services they need," said Kenney.

Clarke, saying community schools would make "a much better city of Philadelphia," explained that there's already a working model of this plan evident in the city every day.

"You're maybe scratching your head, 'What schools are they?' Well guess what? They're not schools. They're prisons," said Clarke. "And damn it, you can't tell me we can deliver those services in prison and we can't have these types of services in a school, in a building for these young people. You can't tell me that."

Kenney and Clarke say they plan to implement the model by leveraging resources from private interests as well as leaning on the city's universities to provide support.

"You're going to hear some good things about that very soon," said Clarke, whose office said it could not yet provide details. "Everybody is on board for this."

In a release, the Kenney campaign credits him with "transforming the culture of 'Southern' into a model for other urban education systems."

Under Hackney's leadership, the high school has also put together one of the most advanced efforts in the city to implement the "community school" approach, which involves re-envisioning schools as accessible, full-service community centers for students and their families.

Kenney has touted community schools as a way to revitalize the city's struggling neighborhood schools. He says he wants to create 25 community schools citywide.

"I have high concentrations of students with high needs," Hackney said earlier this year in explaining his approach at Southern. "I need to make sure I have high levels of support." The school has a robust set of partnerships with outside organizations, and the facility is used by the community outside of school hours.

Hackney will succeed Lori Shorr, who has served as the city's chief education officer throughout the eight years of the Nutter administration.

Hackney, a resident of West Mount Airy, started his career as a math teacher at Germantown High School. After a principal's internship at Overbrook High School, he became assistant principal of South Philadelphia High School. He left the school in 2007 to become the first African American principal of Springfield Township High School in Montgomery County.

A graduate of West Philadelphia High School and Temple University, Hackney earned a master's degree in educational leadership from Lehigh University.

Hackney is married to attorney La-Toya Hackney, and they have a daughter at Masterman who has attended District schools.

District Superintendent William Hite issued a brief statement on the appointment and plans for South Philadelphia High School:

I'm excited about Mayor-Elect Jim Kenney's selection of Otis Hackney as his new Chief Education Officer. Otis was instrumental in our efforts to maintain stability at South Philadelphia High School.

Otis has led Southern since 2010, when he made it his personal goal to revamp school spirit following the violent incidents in 2009. He often said his hope was to change and heal South Philadelphia.

In early 2013, Otis began managing the transition for Bok Technical High School students who would be enrolling at South Philadelphia in the fall. He acted as a great leader and developer of strong family and community relations.

He has a genuine wealth of education experience and will serve all Philadelphians extremely well at this crucial juncture. I am excited about being able to continue to work with Otis on important initiatives.

When searching for a replacement, it was important to find someone who truly connected with Southern and the surrounding community. For that reason, we are placing an Acting Principal in the school who previously worked there as an assistant principal and understands the South Philadelphia High School culture and community.

In a statement, Philadelphia Federation of Teachers president Jerry Jordan cheered the appointment. "There is much work to be done, and many voices we need to hear, and I am delighted that Mayor-elect Kenney has recognized that a Philadelphia educator, Otis Hackney, is the right person to lead the charge." The union was a key supporter of the Kenney campaign.

Hackney's appointment was formally announced at a City Hall press conference Friday at 1:30 pm. Other appointees announced Friday include Mike DiBerardinis as city managing director, Jane Slusser as Kenney's chief of staff, and Deborah Mahler as deputy mayor of intergovernmental affairs.

With the election of Democrats Jim Kenney as mayor and Helen Gym to City Council on Tuesday, there is a new dynamic at City Hall regarding education policy.

Kenney has promised to work toward universal preschool, which was also a focus of the Nutter administration. But the mayor-elect has thrown his support behind community schools as the primary reform strategy for the District. That is a departure from Mayor Nutter's approach. Throughout his administration, Nutter supported the strategy that relied heavily on closing low-performing schools and expanding charters, with the goal of having "a great school" in every neighborhood.

Gym rode to Council on the strength of her education activism, in which she has been severely critical of the dominant District and city policy of closing schools, growing charter enrollment, and primarily using test scores to decide which schools are candidates for turnaround and privatization.

Kenney captured about 85 percent of the mayoral vote, handily defeating Republican Melissa Murray Bailey. Gym was the leading vote-getter among Council at-large candidates with nearly all of the vote counted.

Apparent winners of the other six at-large Council seats on Tuesday were Democrats Derek Green, Allan Domb, Blondell Reynolds Brown, William Greenlee, and Republicans Al Taubenberger and David Oh.

In claiming victory Tuesday night, Gym thanked her family and supporters. Citing the origins of her campaign in the period when former Gov. Tom Corbett was cutting spending not just on education but on other social services, she said she ran because she wanted her children "to remember when times were the worst, people were never silent."

Uniting with teachers

Both Kenney and Gym received robust and unequivocal support from the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, which is currently at war with the District administration. Teachers have not had a new contract or a raise in three years, and in the face of stalemated talks, the School Reform Commission has sought to nullify the contract entirely. The matter is now in court.

At a rally earlier Tuesday, where she and Kenney appeared with PFT leaders, Gym called schools "places of transformation and possibility." She said that they should be defined not by test scores but by a "narrative of dignity of love."

Gym has reiterated over her campaign that the "great schools" strategy is misguided in that it promotes the creation of "islands of greatness in oceans of inequity." For the hardest-to-serve young people – immigrants, those with disabilities, adjudicated youth, the homeless – needs are marginalized, she said.

"It is impossible for them to do well unless we radically change how we look at education for those students," she said.

While rejecting the reliance on privatization as a reform strategy, Gym helped found FACTS charter in Chinatown, which was started to serve an immigrant population and has become one of the most diverse and high-performing charters in the city. Kenney has also served on a charter school board.

Gym said that on Council she will demand more accountability and transparency from the District, perhaps even using subpoena power to get more information year-round instead of just at budget time.

"It’s the only body the SRC has to show up before and account to," she said. The SRC relies on Council and Harrisburg for all its funds; it has no taxing power of its own.

At the same time, she would like Council to "act more like a partner of the School District and not a standoff, not seeing the District as a drain but as a partnership" in building a great city.

The School District is now in dire straits financially, a situation exacerbated by the failure of Harrisburg to pass a budget. On Monday, the SRC borrowed another $250 million just to keep the doors open. Its troubles this year have also deepened due to what has turned out to be a disastrous decision to outsource substitute teacher services.

The company hired, Source4Teachers, promised near universal coverage of teacher absences – 90 percent by January, a vast improvement on what the District was able to do itself last year at 55 to 65 percent. But the firm has been unable to hire and process enough people to cover classes; its best daily "fill rates" have been in the 20 percent range.

How exactly a Kenney administration will approach implementing its vision of education reform is unclear. Both universal pre-K and community schools – which reinvent schools as hubs that provide neighborhoods with social services, recreational opportunities, medical care and adult education – cost money. Community schools would also require far more cooperation among city agencies than has historically existed in Philadelphia.

Kenney has said he would put more money into the School District and into pre-K without raising local property taxes, the largest source of local revenue available to education.

Supporters express optimism

Otis Hackney, principal of South Philadelphia High School, which has been one of the city's most beleaguered, was among well more than 100 people celebrating Gym's election at a party at Fergie's Pub in Center City on Tuesday night.

He is optimistic. Both Kenney and Gym "are such strong advocates for public schools who will add a voice and a vote to make sure the schools get the resources they need," he said.

"We had the best candidate conceivable," said attorney Irv Ackelsberg, a longtime activist and Gym's campaign treasurer. He noted that the campaign was able to buck the party machine and mobilize the grass roots.

"I really believe this is the beginning of a new Philadelphia," he said. "For parents, children and teachers of Philadelphia, this is a new day."

American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten joined Gym at the celebration. "There was no other place in the United States of America that I wanted to be tonight," she said, than with a candidate "who has busted up the charter narrative and created a narrative that says public schools can work for all kids if you give it a chance."

Gym said her campaign was built around "heart and passion and real values talked about every single day around kitchen tables and especially in the streets of this city. ... You carried me to victory, and I am going to carry all of you into City Hall in January, and we're going to show them that this is what democracy looks like."

Editors' note: Helen Gym is a former editor of the Notebook, from 1997 to 1999, and served on the Notebook leadership board until 2013.

One in five students has had some contact with the Department of Human Services.

The rate of chlamydia and gonorrhea among Philadelphia's 15- to 19-year-olds is three times the national average.

In an effort to help city children achieve academically despite socioeconomic difficulties, City Council has started examining the idea of turning schools into social-service hubs.

On Wednesday, Council held its first hearing on the possibility of creating "school-based family service centers," commonly known as "community schools."

"Why should everybody have to come down to the Municipal Services Building and City Hall to get the appropriate services?" said Council President Darrell Clarke. "There's a school in every neighborhood in Philadelphia. Why don't we take every school ... figure out a way to have the appropriate services, not just for the children, but actually for the family?"